


ab initio

by AwayLaughing



Series: the unseen [10]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Backstory, Childhood Trauma, Crimes & Criminals, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Not Canon Compliant, Orphans, Second Shinobi War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-16
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-12-30 07:59:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12104235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AwayLaughing/pseuds/AwayLaughing
Summary: Stuck in war torn northern Fire Country, a young orphan named Ran just tries to survive.





	ab initio

Sitting the in burned out remains of a former bar, Ran dared to peek out at the meagre market that had sprung back up. Over the winter Hikuida had been a wasteland – three of her crew died from being hungry, two more of illness and they’d had nowhere to go. Now people were trickling back in. People said the frontier had been moved back to the actual border and the shinobi who passed through all said the war was going to be done by first summer.

 

Still – seeing an actual noble so far north was more than surprising. There wasn’t a reason for it. There was still fighting and any building in Hikuida not damaged by fire or the shinobis’ earthquakes were full of families. One of the farms near the forest was a bear den now – she knew because she’d been dared to see if it was true. She’d gone, but a shinobi had spotted her and dragged her back to Hikuida, lecturing her on the dangers of little girls spying on mama bears.

 

Then he’d given her food and medicine and disappeared forever. Shinobi were like that.

 

“Why’s she here?” Haku at her back asked.

 

“Dunno,” Ran said. “Maybe she’s crazy.” Haku poked her in response – hard, just above the bum. “Oi!”

 

“Shut up,” he said. “You should grab her purse.” Ran scowled at Haku, rubbing her back and didn’t even bother answering. “Comeon,” he said, “she’s just one old lady.”

 

“If she’s just one old lady you do it,” Ran said. Haku rolled his eye.

 

“You’re fastest,” he said. “And old ladies love you.”

 

Ran scowled. It was true that, being taller than Haku, she was much faster and yet still as agile. And it was also true that old people liked her better than Haku or Daiji. They were always too dirty – and Daiji was big and scary, and people found Haku’s missing eye gross. He’d lost the bandage for it again, and the healers said they couldn’t use a dirty one so they had to wait until someone put clothes on a line or something.

 

“Besides,” he said, “she don’t know Hikuida very well. ‘specially with half of it missing. You’ll get away easy.”

 

“I don’t like it,” she said. “It seems too easy. She wouldn’t be here if she were so easy to get one over.”

 

Haku scoffed. “What, scared Ran- _chin_?”

 

Ran snarled in reply, spinning around and shoving him. “Don’t call me that,” she said. “’specially if you want to keep th’other eye.”

 

Haku snarled right back, sitting back up. “Oh yeah?” he asked, pulling a small blade from his back. Ran rolled her eyes.

 

“Well if you’re gonna do that I won’t have to even try. Playing with knives is how you lost the first one.”

 

Haku let out a cry of rage and rushed toward her, throwing the knife. The knife breezed past her, going wide and Ran and Haku tumbled out onto the slush covered ground. They toussled for a moment before Ran got in the right position. Then she let out a screech, as if frightened, and managed to wriggle away. Bouncing to her feet she forced some tears to her eyes and then promptly made her way to the old lady. Haku, still too angry to notice anything that was happening, charged after her. He came to a sudden stop as she managed to get behind the old lady. Peering out at him, Ran huddled close, clutching her kimono skirts.

 

“Please obaasama,” she whimpered, “he’s been chasin’ me all about...”

 

Haku scowled at that, but backed up a few steps. “You little-”

 

“Young sir,” the woman said, drawing up. “I think you should go, before you say or do anything you’ll regret.”

 

Haku glared up at her for a moment, looking very disreputable with his missing eye and dirty, wet clothing. Then he huffed and turned on his heel. “She won’t be here forever Ran-chin!” he called over his shoulder. Ran gave another whimper in reply. She scuttled away as the old lady turned.

 

“Th-thank you obaasama,” she said. “I-I was just trying to get to the healer for papa and...”

 

“Silence,” the woman said. “And stop snivelling. You’re twice his size right now. Learn how to throw a punch.”

 

That shocked Ran out of her fake tears, and she just blinked up at the woman. “What?” she managed.

 

“And if you expect me to believe your a farmer’s daughter you best learn to speak like one,” the woman continued as if Ran hadn’t spoken. “You have a distinct street urchin accent.”

 

“Hey!” Ran said, offended despite herself. “Listen obaasama-”

 

“None of that. I’ll have my purse back, too.”

 

Ran might be offended, but she wasn’t stupid. The old lady hadn’t even finished the word purse before Ran dodged under her carriage and ran for it.

 

* * *

 

 

“Ran!” Setsu said. “What’d you do? Haku is spittin’ mad.”

 

In response Ran tossed the younger girl the embroidered bag. “I just riled him up because he’s a shit actor,” she said. “HAKU! I GOT YOUR DAMN PURSE!”

 

Setsu was already on the ground, pouring the coins out to count them. She gasped when she did so, eyes wide. “Ryou,” she said. “Not yen.”

 

“What?” Haku’s voice came from their little den and a second later he popped out of one of their exits. “Full ryou?”

 

“’swhat ‘not yen’ means, mush for brains.”

 

“Oh fuck you,” he said. “I ain’t that bad an actor.”

 

“You really are,” Daiji said, shoving him fully out the hole so he could follow him out. “What the seven hells are we gonna do with ryou?”

 

“Shit,” Ran said. Ryou coming from Hikuida orphans was going to be immediately pegged as stolen. Especially Capital stamped ryou. If it’d been Konoha they could say shinobi just gave it them – no one would think they could steel from shinobi.

 

Because they couldn’t – before she’d died Yui’d had a scar to prove it.

 

Thinking, she chewed her lip. “Let’s get inside, first,” she said. Setsu groaned. “’s too hot in there. Daiji caught some rabbits and he’d cooking.”

 

“Rabbits?” Ran asked, “how’d you do that? And we have to go inside, she’ll have the guards or the shinobi snooping around for her by now.”

 

“Stole ‘em outta old man Ryuu’s traps,” he said, bodily lifting Setsu back up. “Come on Setsu-chan.”

 

“Ugh fine,” she said, kicking so he set her back on her feet. Carefully she picked up the ryou – twenty in total. Ran watched her and then followed after into the den.

 

“We can try and cut them into yen,” she said. “It’d look suspicious if we didn’t have any stamped bits though.” And the Konoha stamp looked far too different from the Capitals to be mistaken for it, even just a bit. “Or we could wait until spring and try and get to Tanzaku.”

 

Tanzaku being a proper city and far enough from the border still had its fences and even had actual crime families like you read about in paperbacks. Hikuida used to have fences at least, but most fled when the war came, or died. Plus they weren’t fair at all. Tanzaku fences wouldn’t know anything about them to exploit.

 

“That’s a long wait,” Daiji said. “And I can’t really steal from Ryuu-jii much. He’s gonna get the next batch of shinobi to give him seals. Heard him talking to his son.”

 

“Ugh,” Haku said, slouching into the ragged blankets that made up his bed. “I wish the damn shinobi would go away already.”

 

“If they did that we’d be Iwa,” Ran said.

 

“Ugh,” Haku said again. “So we starve, or get caught?”

 

“Least we’re used to starving,” Ran said.

 

“Not tonight, at least,” Daiji said, going over to his rabbits. They were soup now – basically everything Daiji made turned into stew. Used to be fish stew, until the shinobi emptied the river to drown a forest fire and a bunch of Iwa-nin. She missed the fish stew a bit, though it wasn’t very good it was something to eat. They’d had to put up with gross rations mostly, most of which were worse than the fish stew. And there was never enough of them.

 

Good for helping Setsu lose the last of her baby teeth at least.

 

“Not tonight,” she echoed, sitting on her own pile of blankets. “No problems tonight.”

 

“Deal,” Haku said. “’specially if Daiji stole somethin’ to make the stew taste good for once.”

 

“Oi!”

 

* * *

 

 

Dinner went well, though it tasted like everything Daiji made. They at least went to bed with full stomachs and only a few bruises that hadn’t been there in the morning. Most were from her tousle with Haku.

 

The guards who diverged on the den just before dawn were a problem.

 

Daiji, being the oldest, reacted fastest. Before anyone else even realized what was happening he had Setsu and was dashing out of the nearest exit. There was a yell outside – too deep to be Daiji or Setsu – and then she was scrambling to get to one of the more secret exits herself. Haku, idiot that he was, dove for the purse.

 

“You moron,” she shouted as the main door was finally kicked in. “Come on,” she grabbed his blindside arm, ignoring the fact he hated it and threw him toward the exit that lead to an old well. Not the most secret, but it was too small for adults to get through. Shoving Haku, she meant to follow – and yelped when someone caught her by her hair. Shouting she tried to pull away, ignoring the pain, but another hand caught her by the back of her kimono and a third hand grabbed her by the ankle. Together they hauled her outside, ignoring her yelling and insults.

 

“That’s enough,” a cool, female voice cut through her yelling and the guards’ clanking. “Stop screaming girl, you’ll either upset them or encourage them and both terrible.”

 

“Hanako-gozen,” one of the guards said, sounding wounded. Scrambling to her feet, Ran saw ‘Hanaka-gozen’ wave her hand at him.

 

“Never mind boy,” she said. She was still looking at Ran. “Well.” She said. “I was hoping you’d return the purse once you realized the issues with it. I’m disappointed.”

 

Ran scowled. “So what?” she asked. “You’re still not getting it back.”

 

“It is gone,” a guard she recognized due to his red hair said. “One of the others took it with him.”

 

“I see,” Hanako said. “What’s your name, girl?”

 

“She’s the one they call Ran,” the red haired guard said. Hanako’s eyes raised, face unimpressed.

 

“You are not a girl, are you?” she asked. He shook his head. “Then I was clearly not speaking to you.”

 

“My apologies, ma’am,” he said but Ran could tell she wasn’t listening anymore.

 

“My name is Ran, Hanako-sama,” she said.

 

“Well, Ran-kun,” the woman said. “You’ve caught my eye.”

**Author's Note:**

> This is very non-canon if you're a fan of anime filler, and otherwise probably non-canon based on the timeline working out as it does. But given Kishi's timeline is batshit insane, I reserve the right to do with it what I will.
> 
> edit to add: the bit about the ryou/yen here is totally divorced from reality - I'm basically pretending that "yen" in this world are ryou broken up - in which case their value is weight based. Likely several places wouldn't accept these "yen" but they would be common outside of the biggest city centres (and individual business would have different approaches to it even within the big cities). Partly however there is a stigma against them as they are associated with criminals and the very poor.


End file.
